Linderman and Joan of Arc

Linderman consistently discusses language as policing - a certain all-powerful group of people ultimately decide which sorts of text are to be deemed normal and included as part of the classical text, or classical narrative. However, in reality, the whole idea of the classical text is unnatural - the specific definitions behind the atomistic units (the words and images primarily) are in a sense deconstructed to make way for the fluency of the narrative. In Linderman's piece, she explains that the framing of Joan of Arc is risky when one considers the typical guidelines for a classical narrative. However, the various male power complexes demonstrated in Dreyer's film make way for inclusion into the classical genre. Specifically in regards to Joan, it is problematic that it is a male hand that guides her to the realization that she has committed a wrong. Also, although her political presence is inherently feminist, her political ideologies are actually rarely noted - the significance lies in the fact that she was not absent, as women are expected to be. She was made to be "other" in a form that was not cohesive with the social, as well as political, patriarchy - in a sense, she was too "othered" and thus literally burned at the stake. I think Linderman's use of the word "penetrate" is significant, as she explains that the classical narrative would object to the use of penetration by the gaze, but Falconetti isolates it in a way that infers deflection by the female. In Dreyer's film specifically, Joan of Arc is presented to be revered, rather than just looked at, and I think it is significant that she is granted her own space, especially in regard to the spatial dynamics of gender relations. The film is still able to coincide with that of a classical narrative, as the audience is forced to endure long silences by Joan and a vulnerability on her end that is supposedly inherent to femininity and thus womanhood. Joan's faith in the power of the male regime, whether that be towards her male god, her king or her priest, is so strong that she in turn elicits the Paternoster when her faith is questioned. Linderman goes so far as to say that Christianity is the death of language, as it is the subscription to a name that is not one's own. In the most basic sense, masculinity is A, while femininity is not A - the feminine is what the masculine refuses to know about itself, in terms of space and language. In this sense, the overarching theme of the piece is that woman is waste. Linderman also explains that the film is consistently undercut with extra if not "wasted" shots that could succinctly be removed from the film, except that each of these shots is significant in that they are grotesquely captured by the camera, perhaps even made to represent the displeasing aesthetic surrounding Joan's sacrifice and the preferred aesthetics surrounding woman as human. The grotesque shots are also significant in that they represent polyvocality, which can inherently be linked to the discourse surrounding the female body.